Family forest land availability for the production of ecosystem services in Mississippi, United States

Abstract

Forest land in the southern United States is an important source of ecosystem services. Given a predominance of family forests in the southern United States, forest management decisions of family forest owners are important in influencing the quantity and types of ecosystem services produced. The main study objective was to determine the proportion of family forest land in Mississippi that landowners would be interested in managing for the production of ecosystem services based on a mail survey of 2025 landowners. Approximately, 64% of landowners were interested in managing their forest land for ecosystem services indicating a potential for increasing the production of these services in Mississippi. Weighted least squares (WLS) regression results indicated that importance of personal recreation ownership goal, percentage of forest land area under bottomland hardwoods, percentage of forest land area under natural mixed forests, and past participation in conservation programs were positively associated with the proportion of forest area that landowners were interested in managing for ecosystem services (p<0.05). Future programs should reflect the needs of different landowner socioeconomic groups and incorporate their forest ownership objectives to increase the production of ecosystem services.